Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 6.djvu/394

370 defence. We have not, like Germany and France, powerful neighbors whose hostility might become dangerous. In both these respects we are perfectly safe. Or is there lurking anywhere else in the world a hostile power whose attack we might have to fear? Where is it? Where is the cloud of possible war that might oblige us to watch for our safety armed to the teeth? Where is the danger that forces us to shoulder the fearful burdens under which the backs of European nations are bending, and which nobody but a fool would bear unless constrained by necessity?

But we are told that we must have a large armament to protect our foreign commerce. Must we? When and where was it that our foreign commerce ever suffered for want of a large navy? Before our civil war we had a merchant fleet, and an ocean carrying-trade rivaling that of any nation of the world, while our fleet of war-ships was infinitesimal. Was our foreign commerce ever seriously molested for want of armed protection? Our export trade is constantly growing. We are successfully competing in foreign markets with other nations—notably with England. England is very largely our superior in battleships and guns. Is it our war-fleet that enables us to compete with her so successfully in the foreign market, or is it not rather the fact that our peaceable industries furnish some articles cheaper and better than hers?

Or is it true, as we are told, that we need a great armament to “uphold the Monroe Doctrine”? The Monroe Doctrine is now more than three-quarters of a century old. Has it ever been violated because we did not defend it with big guns? The only attempt against it was the invasion of Mexico by the French Emperor, Louis Napoleon, during our civil war. Nothing can be more certain than that but for our civil war Louis Napoleon would never have dared to touch the American continent,